


I Don’t Want To Talk

by Persephone1832



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, Leave them be, M/M, Song fic, That’s the story, listen, that’s it, they’re sad and old and gay, thirty years of pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-16
Updated: 2019-06-16
Packaged: 2020-05-12 20:54:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,756
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19236904
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Persephone1832/pseuds/Persephone1832
Summary: Jack is Gabriel’s best friend, above all else. Above their history and Jack’s feelings. They are there for one another.





	I Don’t Want To Talk

**Author's Note:**

> This is a song fic based on ‘the winner takes it all’ by ABBA
> 
> Lines in italics are lyrics!

_I_ _don’t_ _want_ _to_ _talk_  
_About_ _the_ _things_ _we’ve_ _gone_ _through_

Jack won’t talk about SEP. He’ll dodge the questions and avert the topic to something safer every time it’s brought up. Everyone assumes that he’s repressed the memories, that the memories of his experience were so traumatic that he couldn’t discuss them. It was traumatic, to a degree, but that isn’t the reason Jack avoids the topic. There’s a different reason.

He doesn’t want to make Gabe uncomfortable.

There is one person that Jack prioritises over everything, from his happiness to his life, and that includes repressing the happier moments of SEP to prevent Gabriel from having to deal with awkward situations and tense conversations.

Ana dragged the memories out once during the Omnic Crisis, which resulted in Jack sobbing in her tent and a promise to not bring it up again. Now all he gets are pitying looks Everytime he rushes to divert people’s attention away from SEP.

Jack can stand her pity, as long as he keeps Gabriel happy.

_I've_ _played_ _all_ _my_ _cards_  
_And_ _that's_ _what_ _you've_ _done_ _too_

Jack is Gabriel’s best friend, above all else. Above their history and Jack’s feelings. They are there for one another. So it makes sense that Gabe asks Jack to be his best man. Jack is physically incapable of saying no to Gabriel, and that’s how he finds himself writing a speech, halfway through a bottle of whiskey, congratulating someone else on marrying the love of his life.

The speech is scrapped later though, when Ana read it and said it was too bitter, too angry at the injustice of it all, too drenched in the feelings hidden under fake smiles and in complicated looks.

Instead the speech was platonic, almost impersonal in its detachment. A joke here, an anecdote there, wrapped up with the same broad smile he gives difficult politicians when they keep him longer than needed, and he wants nothing more than to disappear back into his office and lock the world away.

Gabriel doesn’t cry, though it’s close. Jack almost does as well. Everyone thinks it’s pride, the happiness he feels for his friend overwhelming him, when it’s actually shame. A burning, suffocating type of shame that consumes from the inside. He’s being selfish. He’s putting his happiness before Gabe’s and he hates it. So he dons his mask, smile glowing, and tries not to lean into the touch when Gabe throws his arm around his shoulder in time for the toast.

_It's_ _simple_ _and_ _it's_ _plain_  
_Why_ _should_ _I_ _complain_?

Jack tried to move on. He tried to date other people but all of them lacked something. None of them were Gabe.

The closest he got was an old friend called Vincent. They were together for a while, nearly 2 years, and Jack could actually see a future with him. He loved him, in a way. For a while, he was content.

Then Vincent left. He said it was because he would always come second to Jack’s work, and that wasn’t the best feeling. It was an amicable split, Jack knowing that what Vincent said was true. That didn’t stop Jack from spending a week on Ana’s sofa, mourning the what ifs of their relationship.

Gabriel noticed something different with Jack, but he didn’t know what. He didn’t know how to ask, so instead he remained in the shadows as his best friend slipped further out his reach.

_You_ _must_ _know_ _I_ _miss_ _you_  
_But_ _what_ _can_ _I_ _say?_  
_Rules_ _must_ _be_ _obeyed_

Gabriel and his wife got divorced eventually. They just didn’t work out. She felt that she was always competing for his affections, whether with Jack or his job, and he felt that she only really loved the idea of him. Years of fiery arguments and icy silences reached a peak when she walked into his office one day and demanded he sign the divorce papers.

Jack was the first to know, for obvious reasons. Gabe needed his best friend, needed someone who loved him for everything he was and wasn’t. Jack was that person for him, probably always would be.

And if Gabriel held Jack a little tighter than normal, desperately trying to imitate the easy affection that filled their days in SEP, it was no one else’s business.

_Spectators_ _of_ _the_ _show_  
_Always_ _staying_ _low_.

“I won’t always be able to protect you! I can’t keep making excuses about you and Blackwatch when you insist on keeping me in the dark about everything!”

Arguments had become commonplace between Jack and Gabriel, people knowing to stay away once they started because it got messy fast. It matched the end of his marriage, Gabriel thought, a bitter twinge to the words.

“Why do you care? Is it this perfect little Morrison’s good deed of the day? Protecting the poor, helpless Latino boy? I didn’t ask for your help, so why care?” Gabriel sneered, noting the subtle clenches of Jack’s jaw, the way his anger seemed to fill the room, so different from the shy farm boy he met at 19.

“Because I’m in love with you, you fucking idiot!”

Gabriel flinched, eyes widened slightly. Jack seemed to realise what he’d said, and schooled his face into the perfect mask of neutrality, completely blank except for the minute twitch of his eyebrow, showing the anxiety bubbling under the surface.

Gabe took a step forward, reaching out towards the other.

“Jack, I-“

He was interrupted by an bang, way too close for comfort. His eyes darted up, noticing the spiderweb of cracks spreading across the ceiling. Gabriel can feel Jack’s panic as if it were his own, body frozen in place as dust starts falling through the cracks. A few more seconds and the roof would go, probably killing both of them. At best, only one would survive, and Gabriel made a split second choice as to who that would be.

Before Jack could react, he felt the floor rushing up to greet him as Gabriel threw himself over him. Almost immediately after they hit the floor, the first parts of ceiling finally falling as another explosion shook the room.

Jack watched with terror as the centre started to come loose. He heard a whispered confession, felt a tightening of the arms around him, before the roof caved in and his vision went black.

_I_ _apologize_  
_If_ _it_ _makes_ _you_ _feel_ _bad_  
_Seeing_ _me_ _so_ _tense_

Jack felt the telltale chill before he opened the door, telling him who the intruder was without him having to see him. He entered anyway, too tired to forgo sleep again just because Reaper had decided to drop by.

With a sigh, he shut the door behind him, visor providing the only light in the room. It was exactly as he left it, posters hanging on the wall yellow with age. It must have been 10 years since he’d been in this room. The only difference was that 10 years ago, the corner had been free of ghosts.

The bed creaked as he sat on it but Jack ignored the sound as he leant forward to remove his boots, the coarse laces scratching against his palm the only thing stopping him from becoming trapped in his own head.

The jacket was next, already half off when Gabriel spoke.

“Why did you wait so long to tell me? Why wait until we were about to die before telling me?”

Jack sighed again, placing his jacket on the bedside table and removing his visor.

“I didn’t plan it that way. I didn’t even plan to tell you in the first place.”

“Why? What did you have to gain from hiding it?”

“We grew up, Gabe. We were no longer 20 year olds fooling around in the middle of the night to distract us from the death that surrounded us at every point. You wanted an eternity, and you didn’t want it with me. I had to accept that. I knew I was your best friend above everything else, and that had to come before my feelings.”

Gabriel had moved from the corner, moon shining on the pale bone mask, adding to Gabe’s whole monster aesthetic. Jack tried not to flinch when he sat next to him, the bed protesting the weight of two super soldiers on top of it. Gabriel unclipped his mask and placed it on the bed next to him.

They were silent for a moment, the sound of Jack removing the tens of belts strapped across his body and the owl in the tree outside filled the room. The quiet peace was broken when Gabe spoke again.

“Did I ever tell you why my marriage fell apart?”

“Too many fights, too little making up?” That what Gabe had said at the time, a joke about how little he was getting laid. Jack had chuckled, a pathetic attempt at hiding his discomfort at the conversation topic.

“Do you know what we fought about most?”

“Work?”

Jack didn’t understand Gabriel’s sudden need to discuss his marriage, especially with how their last conversation ended. He’d rather not blurt out that even over seven years, two faked deaths and one of them joining a literal terrorist organisation, he’d still follow the man in front of him to the ends of the earth without complaint.

“You, Jack. They were about you. I’d always thought of you as my eternity, but I was scared, I panicked and told you that you weren’t allowed to tell anyone about what happened SEP, and you agreed! You went along with for thirty plus years, despite being in love with me and-“

Jack cut off the nervous rambling by gripping Gabriel’s overcoat and pulling him forward, smashing their mouths together.

It wasn’t a soft kiss, it was angry and it hurt, filled with years of longing and bitterness. Jack didn’t notice that he was crying until a taloned glove wiped a tear from his cheek. He pulled away enough to breathe, forehead resting on Gabriel’s as they gulped air into their lungs.

“Why did you kiss me?”

“You were rambling. I needed a way to shut you up.” Gabe chuckled, breathy and light, a sound Jack had missed like a blind man misses the sun.

“It was definitely effective.”

Jack rolled his eyes and pulled Gabe in again, vowing to himself that he’d never let go. Gabe was his eternity, and he was Gabriel’s. It just took them a while to figure it out.

_But_ _you_ _see_  
_The_ _winner_ _takes it all._

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed it!


End file.
